Karachi police kill TTP commander

KARACHI - Police claimed to have killed a commander of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan along with his four other accomplices in an alleged encounter here on Tuesday.District Malir police’s officials said a police party conducted a raid in the stronghold area of TTP, Gulshan-e-Bunair on a tip off. They said they faced massive resistance from the militants during the raid, on which more contingent of law enforcers was called to the area. The entire locality was cordoned off during the operation, however, an exchange of fire between the militants and the police continued for an hour. Five militants were killed while few of them were managed to escape under the cover of firing.Police shifted the bodies to Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC) for autopsies and later shifted to morgue for identification. Two of them were identified as Javed Mehsud aka Omar and Irfan. SSP Rao Anwar said Javed Mehsud was the ringleader. He was operating the Taliban network in Gulshan-e-Bunair locality of Landhi for the last many years. “He arrived here due to the military operation in Swat,” he added. Anwar further claimed the police have also found a letter from their hideout. In the letter written by the TTP chief, these TTP operatives in Karachi were asked to escalate target killings of the law enforcers, particularly the police in Karachi following the military operation in North Waziristan. Police said the militants killed in the encounter were involved in over 50 cases of target killings. Besides police and rangers, these militants had also attacked an anti-polio vaccination team in Gulshan-e-Bunair, killing two women members in December 2012.SSP Anwar further claimed that these suspects were also involved in various cases of bomb blasts and recently they also targeted the Ayub Goth police post of the District East. He also claimed to have recovered around 25 kilogramme of explosives, pressure cooker bombs, tennis ball bombs, huge cache of arms and ammunition from their hideout. The police were trying to ascertain the identities of the remaining militants.